


from the edge of the deep green sea

by devviepuu



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Angst and Romance, Captain Cobra - Freeform, Captain Swan Supernatural Summer 2020 (Once Upon a Time), F/M, HEA Always, Season/Series 03, introspective as hell, pan's curse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:53:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25850881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devviepuu/pseuds/devviepuu
Summary: Pan's curse overtakes Storybrooke and Emma gets caught up in its magic.Killian is going to find her.  He'll always find her.But Pan has a game to play and Emma is his shiny new piece.  He's set the rules, and Killian needs to follow them or pay the price.(3A canon divergence, loosely inspired by a soulmate prompt where your soulmate is the only person you remember from your past life / you dream about them but cannot remember the details)(prompt 14 for writer's month 2020)
Relationships: Baelfire | Neal Cassidy & Captain Hook | Killian Jones, Captain Hook | Killian Jones & Henry Mills, Captain Hook | Killian Jones & Tinker Bell, Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan
Comments: 45
Kudos: 94
Collections: Captain Swan Supernatural Summer 2020, The Great Captain Swan No-Curse Renaissance, Writer's Month 2020





	from the edge of the deep green sea

**Author's Note:**

> this is prompt 14 for August Writer's Month 2020: metamorphosis  
> art provided by @mariakov81. [you can see the full resolution version here](https://courtorderedcake.tumblr.com/post/627896873066348544/inspired-by-the-perfection-the-story-from-the-edge).

* * *

The sky resembles a backlit canopy, holes punched in it where the stars shine through. In the brightness of the starlight it is possible to see shapes moving that align with neither the stars nor the planets. Henry was fond of telling stories about this realm’s fascination with alien beings and their flying contraptions. He called them “identified flying objects”. Thrilling tales, to be sure, but the truth is rather more gruesome: they are shadows.

Perhaps they do look brighter against the light of the full moon, but the light of the moon will shortly fade behind a shadow of its own and the shadows in the sky would still be there.

Killian Jones stands knee-deep in the water and counts down the minutes.

No, wait.

\--

He dreamt of her.

_The water was fucking freezing and it sent a shock straight through her as Emma was swept over the side of the_ Jolly Roger _. It was different, going in by accident; she was unprepared for how cold it was and how it pulled all of the air out of her body, how it weighted down her clothes and her boots and how her hair felt like it was strangling her._

_She kicked, desperately, kicked her boots off--her trousers, her jacket--and felt the momentary relief until there was pain. Fire that started in her toes and crawled up her legs as she kicked, kicked--she felt as though her legs were pulling her down, dead weight that seemed to elongate as she sank, and her head was spinning. She was dizzy, she was shivering, she was out of breath and the piercing pain was in her lungs, too._

_It was everywhere--flashes of it starting on the back of her neck, behind her ears--once, twice, three times on each side._

_She couldn’t breathe and she was on fire and she couldn’t feel her legs, her eyes were burning from the salt in the water and there was nothing she could do, nothing except take a deep breath as she flung herself, instinctively, deeper._

_The first gulp of harbor water was like a breath of life, pleasantly cool as it extinguished the fire within her. A wave of vertigo crashed through her--an intense explosion of light--and when Emma opened her eyes, she saw clearly._

He woke up as he always did--sweating, panting--and forgot immediately, unable to hold on to more than the barest whisps of a memory and the taste of seawater in his mouth.

But not a day went by that he did not think of her.

\--

“We’ll find her, Hook,” Snow White assures him. It is as familiar to him now as his inability to remember his dreams, and as frustrating; she has been saying that to him for nearly a year. In her defense, most days she does not remember how long it has been--doesn’t remember his proper name or where her husband is or even that Emma is gone. Most days, she doesn’t remember much of anything.

In the first days immediately after the Curse, though--immediately after they’d lost Emma, after she’d gone overboard during Pan’s casting--it was Snow White who had found the first and nearly the only sign of Emma. She’d rung David on the talking phone and Killian had followed them--Neal, Henry, Regina and David--out to the shoreline to see the one relic of Emma they’d managed to obtain: Washed up on the beach, scattered amongst the remains of the seagulls’ breakfast, was a necklace.

“I gave that to her,” Bae--Neal--had said, fingering the stylized swan in cheap metal that had corroded slightly from its time in the harbor. “I thought she’d stopped wearing it.”

“She did.” Pan materialized in front of them. “But it’s such a nice touch, don’t you think?” He affected surprise, his hands pressed against his cheeks and his mouth open in exaggerated shock.

Killian turned his head toward Neal only to find the other man staring back at him, already understanding what the others did not.

This was one of Pan’s games.

This was Pan, already exerting his power over what used to be Storybrooke.

David drew his sword and Regina readied a fireball and Snow grasped for her bow and Killian sighed and snapped, “What have you done with Emma?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Pan fluttered his eyelashes but his voice was honed to cut and his eyes sparkled with dark mischief. Killian sucked in a breath and exhaled, a ragged thing that made him feel like he was deflating. Of-bloody-course the demon had been watching them--of course he had.

“She’s fine, if that’s what you’re asking. ‘The Savior’. She never disappoints. She’s got fire,” he said, and smirked. “I like fire. She’s--special.”

“We know,” Snow said.

“We’ll find her,” David said. His sword went back into its scabbard and his arm went around Henry as he nodded meaningfully at Neal. “That’s what this family does.”

“We’ll find her,” Killian repeated.

Neal put a placating hand on David’s shoulder and glanced over at Killian again, and he knew they were both thinking the same thing. If Pan had taken Emma, they wouldn’t find her until he was ready for them to find her. Because just like Neverland, Storybrooke was now his gameboard.

And Emma was his shiny new piece.

“In your dreams, Captain,” Pan said, and vanished.

That was the first day Henry had begun counting, marking the days until they saw his mother again.

\--

The food of this realm was something Killian was still getting used to, but in Storybrooke one went to Granny’s for food, information and strategy--so to Granny’s Killian went. The old woman took pity on him, brewing him a cup of tea and presenting him with a plate of eggs--”It beats chimera,” she said--and Henry, to the surprise of both Killian and his father, insisted upon sharing his fried potatoes when Killian was summoned to the table by Prince Charming himself.

That might also take some getting used to.

Killian scratched the back of his neck nervously and smiled at the boy. The smile he received in return was small and tentative and brief, as it lasted only until Neal reclaimed his son’s attention by shoving a plate across the table. Killian’s smile faded and he sighed just as Ruby joined them, pulling up a chair and inserting herself into the conversation.

“I can look for her,” Ruby said.

Killian’s eyebrow went up.

“Ruby’s got certain--abilities,” David said, as if that meant anything.

“She’s a werewolf!” Henry said. “You’re going to try and follow mom’s scent, aren’t you?”

Ruby smiled at Henry and said, “You know it, Henry.” She added, “It’s the full moon tonight. Usually I stay here in Granny’s freezer but let’s see if maybe I can do something useful for a change.”

Killian’s eyebrow was still up and Ruby stared at him, a silent challenge.

“Give him a little credit, Ruby,” David said.

“This is a game to Pan,” Killian said. “Are you sure--”

“If it’s a game, then we can win,” Snow said. “But only if we try.”

Relenting, Ruby winked at him. “It’s--what was your phrase? ‘Quite real’, I promise.”

“Leave it to Hook to always know a person’s _value_ ,” Neal said, almost under his breath.

Snow turned slightly, looking first at Killian and then at Neal. There was a question in her eyes and Killian turned away, his hand rubbing the back of his neck. So much had changed in six days but Neal, it seemed, was not ready to forgive.

And the people of Storybrooke had no reason to trust him.

Not the way that Emma had.

But he was a part of something, now. He would honor that--honor her.

Snow reached for Ruby’s hand and squeezed it. “Thanks,” she said.

“Emma’s family,” Ruby said.

“We’re gonna find her,” Henry said. “That’s what this family does. Right, Dad?” He smiled up at his father, his eyes hopeful.

“You know it, buddy,” Neal said, but his smile did not reach his eyes.

\--

Time seemed to stop while they waited for Ruby to return. Snow and David retired to their loft and Henry, with some reluctance, went back with Regina to their home. Neal shifted in his seat, the material squealing under his movements with increasing frequency as the hours dragged on. But Killian wasn’t going anywhere, not until there was news, and if Neal didn’t want to be the first to leave his discomfort was his own lookout. So they sat, waiting and silent, an unspoken something hanging in the air until Neal broke first.

“Hook,” he said.

“I am not backing down from _this_.” Killian was adamant, his words harsher than he intended. He swallowed and lowered his voice. “Emma is missing. I will help find her. Everything else can wait until after that.”

“What makes you think that Emma even wants you looking for her?”

Killian’s hand curled into a fist that he had to force himself to release, but Neal was not wrong. Emma had left him before--more than once. But something had shifted in Neverland and it was more than just their fleeting dalliance.

It was the way she looked at him.

He had nothing more to go on than that but he knew in his bones that he could not leave her now, not when she needed more than ever for someone to believe in her.

To have hope.

“No matter what you think of me, Bae,” Killian said, “I do not give up on the people I care about. I _will_ assist in the search. _When_ we find her, anything else is up to Emma.”

Neal’s look was more than slightly suspicious as he sighed.

“Baelfire,” Killian said, striving for patience he did not feel. “Henry is your son. _Emma’s_ son. Your mother’s grandson. Do you honestly believe there is ever a single moment when I look at him and don’t consider what might have been?”

“With Emma?” Neal glared. “Yeah, that’s kind of the problem.”

“With you, Bae.” Killian sighed and repeated: “With you. What happened between us, it haunts me to this day. It’s why I offered my services in the rescue of Henry.”

Neal guffawed. “Emma--”

“Had very little to do with it, besides offering me the chance,” Killian said, his voice even and his words sure. “What happened between her and me--”

“Don’t,” Neal said.

“--was nothing more or less than what you saw. She offered me a chance and I took it. And since our return, I’ve respected the boundaries we’ve agreed upon--including those set by Emma. And, Bae--” he waited until Neal looked at him, squarely meeting his gaze. “I will not destroy another family. Especially not this one. Are we clear?”

Very, very slowly, Neal nodded. “Yeah,” he said again. “God, everything is just so colossally fucked up, isn’t it?”

Killian snorted a laugh, but his mirth was short-lived. “I’m sorry about your father,” he said.

Neal studied him. “Are you?”

“I gave him passage on _my_ ship to find _your_ son,” Killian pointed out. “I think we can safely be said to have buried the hatchet.”

It was Neal’s turn to snort.

“Glad to see the two of you together again,” Tinkerbell said from the archway that separated the diner from the lodgings.

“Join us?” Killian asked, gesturing at the empty seat next to him; she surprised him by agreeing, sliding in with sympathy in her eyes as she glanced between the two of them.

Wordlessly, Killian pulled out his flask, holding it out to Neal. He opened it and took a long draught before passing it to Tink. They sat like that, quietly, taking it in turns to share the flask, for several minutes before Neal yawned and went to excuse himself.

Tink followed shortly thereafter and as she was leaving she leaned over to Killian and kissed him on his cheek. “I believe in you,” she whispered. “In both of you.”

And then she was gone.

\--

_There was the grip of the scarf as it tightened around her wrist and his breath against her fingers as he looked at her through his eyelashes. She held the compass in her hand and it pointed at him.  
_ _“You’re not real.”  
_ _She inhaled, felt the water fill her lungs and she saw him, helpless, drowning  
_ _Swallowed into the darkest depths_

_Killian_

Killian woke up coughing, breathing heavily as the silverware clattered to the floor, and all he heard was the sound of his name on her lips--his given name.

\--

The moon set and the sun rose and there was no sign of Ruby.

“Is that normal?” Killian asked David, who shrugged.

“Wait.” Snow pointed out the window from their booth at Granny’s, the same booth where Killian had fallen asleep the night before. “Is that--”

A wolf, larger than any Killian had ever seen, stumbled into the courtyard and howled. Mrs. Lucas swore under her breath with a proficiency that would have done a sailor proud and ran out the front door with a bundle of red cloth in her arms, which she spread over the agitated beast. As she pulled back a corner of the fabric, Killian saw Ruby, unconscious.

“Is _that_ normal?” Killian asked David, who was frowning.

David paused before he answered and in the space of that breath Killian felt dread.

“No,” David said, and went to follow his wife out of the diner.

\--

Ruby hadn’t found anything.

Ruby hadn’t found anything and Mrs. Lucas decreed that she would spend the rest of the full moon in the freezer, where she was safe; the wolf, however, had other plans.

Snow White was dispatched to find her and Killian became aware of this only when his new talking phone device rang in his pocket.

“Killian.” It was a child’s voice, and Killian wasn’t sure which was more surprising: Henry phoning him or using his given name. “You need to come quick. We need your help.”

Killian very nearly ran from the docks back to the diner and found himself corralled into a search party--not for Ruby but for Mary Margaret.

“Snow White does not get lost in the woods, lad,” Killian said. He tried to keep his voice upbeat as he followed Neal and David and Henry out toward where Snow had said she would be. Regina was in the lead, her face grimly determined as she held out her hand to guide the magic of her locator spell.

They were in a clearing that Killian would swear was familiar--he had been through it, he was sure, multiple times during his own treks in these woods--and there was Snow.

“You found me,” she said, and her voice was low and soft and private, full of relief as she had eyes only for her husband.

“Did you ever doubt that we would?” David smiled. “Mary Margaret, how did you of all people end up lost?”

“Mary Margaret?” For an instant, Snow’s eyes glossed over and Killian felt it again, the dread in the pit of his stomach. It did not lessen when her eyes cleared and her gaze fell upon him.

“Hook.”

“Henry called him,” David explained, running his hand down his wife’s arm as he looked closely at her. “Regina, is she--?”

Regina stepped forward and Snow’s eyes flashed--then suddenly they were bright again, focused.

“I’m fine,” she said. “What about Ruby?”

“Didn’t you find her?” Henry asked. Neal had pulled him back and away from his grandmother.

Killian knew the answer before Snow’s face fell and as she led the way out of the clearing and back toward the town, the unease inside of him continued to churn.

Pan’s magic was starting to seep in, and that meant they were already running out of time. It could be days or weeks or _centuries_ before they knew it, but the people of Storybrooke were out of time. Killian could only hope--could only pray to gods that he did not believe in that he and Neal and Tink and Henry were immune because of their circumstances.

And that they found Emma as quickly as possible--because they were going to need a Savior. Soon.

\--

_There were arrows and the points had black tips and that made them dangerous. There was a hook against a sword and she was on the ground, staring into a pair of eyes that could have been her own; she blinks and they are dark blue.  
_ _“I too know what it is like to lose hope,” he said, the child behind him making chalk marks on the wall. A compass rose and stars on the ceiling (It’s cold, she’s cold, she’s shivering and he is warmth)  
_ _She opened her mouth to speak and no sound emerged. There was only water.  
_ _Her hands were on her neck, behind her ears. She felt them, the slits, flapping--gasping--and she_

“Killian?” Tink’s voice was full of concern. “Are you sleeping at all, mate?”

“Not really, no,” he said.

“Bad dreams?” She looked at him, a knowing look. A _knowing_ look, for sleep on Pan’s island had never been particularly restful without plenty of rum and--other distractions.

Killian shook his head, slowly. “I can’t remember,” he said.

\--

The night Pan came to him was the night they lost David.

It was difficult to reckon time--to count the days and the nights--but for Henry’s counting in his notebook. Time had changed, slowed; the days and the nights bled into each other. It was easy to get lost in its flow and at the same time not notice its passing. Were it not for the dreams, the dreams of her which blessed and haunted him every night and then left him empty come morning, he would not have noticed the passage of time at all, because nothing had changed.

They had found no further sign of Emma.

Belle had found nothing in her books.

Regina had protested ignorance but there was something in her posture, in the set of her lips, that made Killian wary.

Where had Neal been?

Neal had been holed up in the library with Belle, day after day after day with nothing to show for it and no interest in anything but Henry.

Henry, who was counting days in his notebook and shrinking in on himself, slowly, as time passed and they found no sign of his mother while his father, when he could be bothered, tried to interest him in toy swords and some sport involving a long stick of wood and a tiny leather ball.

It was almost a shock to register the total darkness as Killian walked back toward the docks from the Charmings’ loft. It didn’t feel like Storybrooke, that darkness. It felt like Neverland.

“He just collapsed,” Snow had said as Killian walked in. “I don’t--Killian--”

She was sobbing. Killian had never seen Snow White cry before; not in Neverland, not when they’d lost Emma, not when Ruby came back disoriented and ill or she’d gotten lost in the woods or Killian came back from the _Jolly Roger_ day after day, empty-handed and heartsick after another fruitless search. She’d sent one of her birds with a message asking for help--the talking phones had gotten less reliable, and perhaps that should have been a sign--and he’d come, but this was beyond even his experience.

David looked like he had been killed, except for his visible breathing.

Regina and Henry came in just behind Killain and while Henry rushed at his grandfather, throwing himself at the floor, Regina hung back. Her face was pale, nearly white, which made the shock of her lipstick seem even brighter.

“I think he’s in a coma,” Snow said. “I’ve seen him like this before--” she glanced at Regina “--and this is what it looked like. I’ve called Dr. Whale, he should be here soon--”

Killian followed Snow’s gaze and kept it there, glaring at Regina. She glared back. He raised an eyebrow. Her eyes narrowed and she said nothing and he wondered if she _knew_ , knew what was going to happen to these people, one by one, those who had come to this realm courtesy of her curse and her magic. Killian sighed, turning his attention back to Snow and the fallen prince.

“If I may ask, milady,” Killian said, keeping his voice lowered as Regina moved toward Henry, rubbing soothing circles on his back. “Why did you summon me?”

“You know you don’t need to call me that,” Snow said, and he saw her try--and fail--to smile.

“Why didn’t you call Neal?”

She looked surprised that he had even asked. Then her look turned thoughtful. “Emma had her reasons for leaving him, didn’t she?”

Killian recalled the look in her eyes at the beanstalk, the way she had looked at him and lied and left him chained and at a giant’s mercy. _I can’t take the chance I’m wrong about you_ , she’d said, and he’d understood it to mean that she had been wrong about someone before in the most painful way imaginable.

Then he’d learned who Henry’s father was and--

“Aye,” he said. “I believe she did. But Bae, he was a good lad, he just--”

“He’s his father’s son,” Snow said.

“Aye,” Killian said. “He is.” And he said nothing else.

“Emma would be proud of you,” Snow said suddenly. “Heroes and villains, working together for her, and it’s because of you. You’re the one that’s keeping us together, Killian. That’s why I called you. Well--after I called Whale.”

Only Dr. Whale never showed; Snow and Regina were left to debate taking David to the hospital on their own, only to determine that it might not be worth the effort.

“I don’t think it would matter,” Regina said, and Snow White looked like she agreed. Killian excused himself from the loft and encountered the all-encompassing blackness of the New Neverland at night. He couldn’t stay in the loft and watch Snow White and wait to hear a hope speech that for once, even she couldn’t seem to summon. Not from the bedside of her unconscious, unresponsive True Love.

“This is all part of his game,” Killian had said. “The curse is getting stronger. I fear that David will not be the last.”

“Don’t let him win,” Snow said. “Don’t let him get into your head.”

But she said nothing else.

He shivered and tried not to think of Emma, but she was never far from his thoughts. He had not been prepared for the overwhelming sense of loss her absence left him with. There was nothing about her that he did not miss--from the way she challenged him to the way that she sounded when she laughed to the flash of her eyes when he’d gotten her to smile, the way that her hair shone when he sat next to her by the fire and spoke of nothing at all.

The way she looked at him and made him _feel_.

Just _feel_.

They hadn’t known each other that long.

They were barely more than reluctant allies.

And yet he dreamed of her--every night.

Killian shook his head and tried to tell himself he was merely imagining the cries echoing in the night.

“You’re not,” Pan said. He hovered in front of Killian. “You didn’t know there were Lost Ones created by the Evil Queen’s curse? The name seems like a bit of a giveaway.” He paused, considering. “I think I like it. Reminds me of home.”

Killian stopped and stared, determined to not give the demon any reaction.

“Where’s Doctor Whale, then?” Pan asked. “Oh, wait, I know where he is.” He disappeared and materialized about six feet away over a body prone on the ground.

Killian said nothing. He stared straight ahead.

“The shadow, you know.” Pan shrugged. “I guess Prince Charming’s not going anywhere. Not tonight, anyway. Just as well--we wouldn’t want Snow White getting lost again, would we?”

Killian raised an eyebrow. “What do you want?”

“This is the new Neverland, Hook,” Pan said. “All of these people, these pawns, are going to fade away. We can go back to the way things were.”

“You want me to work for you.”

“I want to help you, Captain,” Pan said. “You work for me, you can leave. You can look for her.”

But she was _here_ , she was here in Storybrooke, he knew it, he _felt_ it, he believed it. And if she was here, he would find her.

He would always find her.

He had her family, her friends, her son helping. The entire town. Even Belle, who owed him nothing--less than nothing--

“No,” Killian said.

“You know the consequences when you don’t listen to me, Hook.”

“All curses can be broken,” Killian said.

“You’re not getting it,” Pan said. “I’m saying that I’ve got her now, Killian, and everyone is exactly where I want them to be.” Pan looked around and gave an exaggerated shudder. “Bit dark here, isn’t it?” Overhead in the burnt-out street lamp a light appeared. “I always wanted fairy lights,” Pan said.

And then Killian saw: Trapped within the glass was one of the fairies from the convent.

“Keep dreaming, Captain. Now we’re really going to find out what kind of man you are.”

\--

Killian sailed nearly every day, turning as he always did to the sea for comfort and purpose when his emotions became too much for him to bear. The sea was the last place he had seen her and he could almost feel her with him each time he hoisted the sheets and raised the anchor and sailed farther and farther out along where the border between the Curse and the Land Without Magic remained untouched. He did not even attempt to recruit a crew for these missions; although Killian felt certain that for the Savior he could round up a veritable army of dwarves and crickets and mice from the garage he did not think it was worth the risk.

Especially when two of the dwarves were already missing.

He had offered to take Neal--to take Henry--but Neal had said no.

“He’s my son, Hook, and he doesn’t need a pirate for a babysitter.”

So he sailed without a crew and relied on the magic hewn into the wood of the ship to keep him on his course as he followed the indicators from the locator spell he had gotten from Tink. Killian saw the sandbar exposed by the low tide and, as he approached, dropped anchor and dove in. The spell propelled itself ahead of him, coming to a stop over a piece of driftwood caught on the sandbar, and he saw what had drawn it there: A scrap of white fabric and a red leather jacket. Ignoring the way his heart seemed to contract inside of him, Killian tucked them into his satchel and plunged back into the water.

That’s when they attacked, pulling him under so quickly it felt like a rip tide until he felt the strong grip on his feet. He swung with his hook, immediately and instinctively on the defensive after two centuries of avoiding them.

If they were not on a mission for _him_ , if they were just amusing themselves, he had a chance--

And then Killian saw her.

He saw her, saw the wreath of blonde hair floating around her, wild and magnificent and like a living thing under the water. She looked at him with the clear eyes of a child; not in age, but in nature--with a child’s creativity and a child’s capacity for either cruelty or kindness, dependent solely on their whims.

She looked at him and there was no recognition on her face as he choked on the seawater but her face softened in unexpected sympathy as she playfully swatted the others--her sisters, for that was their way--away from him, as if he was one their toys, as if she was claiming him. Killian felt her arms hooked under his armpits as she hauled him to the surface and the last thing he remembered before he passed out, puking the green water out of his lungs and onto the sandbar, was the feel of her fingers against his forehead as they brushed a lock of hair out of his eyes.

\--

Killian went straight back to Tink’s encampment in the woods and proceeded to drink so much rum that he blacked out and when he dreamed he dreamed of the feeling of her fingers against his forehead, against the back of his neck, curling around the edges of his hair and the way she had pulled on the lapels of his coat in a hot jungle in Neverland.

\--

Just at its edges, the moon is beginning to darken and it is time.

Killian stands knee-deep in the water, counting down, and then--

There she is.

The mass of hair that had crowned her in the water is, on land, a silken, seaweed-studded fall that covers most of her torso, the tips of her breasts just peeking out from behind the blonde curtain. Her head is turned, her neck exposed on one side, and he can see behind her ear the inch-long slashes, close together and on the diagonal. Her body is nothing but sinew and strength; flawless skin that looks as though it has been carved from marble, as cold and as smooth. Her slimness is accentuated by the flare at her hips where the skin gave way to scales and where her legs and feet should be there is a tail that ends in an enormous feathered fin--flecks of blue and purple along its length that make her look like she is covered in liquid silver and Killian cannot breathe, afraid that if he moves even a muscle she will vanish.

She is still so beautiful, still the most beautiful thing he has seen in any realm.

Emma Swan washes up onto the beach, unconscious and unresponsive, magic--presumably--guiding her slumber and Killian can do nothing but stare.

“Swan,” he whispers, finally exhaling, feeling a smile he wasn’t sure he was still capable of stretching across his face.

As if in response to her name she moans, beginning to thrash in the shallow receding tide; as she thrashes, her tale lights up--every scale as though it is on fire, and Emma moans again, in pain this time, gasping as if she cannot breathe or does not remember how--and the tail splits as the fins shrink rapidly into legs and feet at least a foot shorter than the tail had been. Killian runs forward, looping his arms under hers and pulling her out of the water and then, belatedly, strips himself to the waist and wraps her in his shirt and his waistcoat and his greatcoat. Merfolk care nothing for human prudishness but Emma Swan would not be glad to know that he has seen her, all of her, without invitation.

“Swan?” he says, his hand wrapped around hers, feeling the stiff, slippery aquatic blubber of the mermaid slowly give way to human skin and softness. “Emma?”

Her eyes open and her hand grips his, hard. She looks at him--at her body, at her legs and her feet and the way she is suddenly shivering all over--

And screams.

\--

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,” Neal said. “There are no mermaids in Storybrooke.”

When Killian had woken with a killing head and the taste of seawater still in his mouth, he saw that Tink had contacted Neal, who immediately proceeded to call Killian several different kinds of crazy.

“We don’t know _what_ ’s in Storybrooke anymore, mate,” Killian said.

“How do you know,” Neal said, sounding like an odd mixture of reasonable and whining child, “that you didn’t just imagine it? You’ve been under a lot of stress lately, Killian. Maybe Tink’s spell didn’t work. You should have gone to Regina for that, anyway.”

The thing was, he had gone to Regina first; she had declined to be of assistance. There had been a look on her face--resignation--that made Killian uneasy. He knew it all too well, having seen that look in the mirror for more than two hundred years.

“Hook,” she’d said. “You know I can’t help you.”

“I know,” he said.

“I mean, I _can’t_.”

“I know,” he said again. “Did he threaten Henry?”

Regina had looked surprised, her mouth partially open before she closed it and nodded, slowly.

“You know you’re going to lose your son either way,” Killian said.

“I’d rather forget him then see him hurt in _any_ way,” Regina said.

Killian sighed, his hand rubbing the back of his neck. He nodded.

“I’m sorry,” Regina said. She had sounded as though she’d meant it.

Killian said: “Bae, you know Neverland magic about as well as any of us. What do _you_ think it means that Snow White got lost in the woods?”

Neal went silent.

“The werewolf is losing her ability to keep her human mind separate and to shift back in the daylight,” Killian continued. “Prince-bloody-Charming is in a coma which, I am informed, is a reversion to the state in which he arrived in this realm. Two of the dwarves are missing and I saw the doctor’s body with my own eyes after the Shadow attacked him. And Emma--”

He gulped.

Was he really sure of what he saw?

“When Emma was swept overboard whilst we tried to make our escape, the magic must have taken her--or Pan did. Perhaps he was just making the most of a sudden opportunity for one of his games.”

“That would be like him,” Tink said sadly. “And poor Emma, caught up in it. Do you think she--”

“--remembers who she was?” Killian laughed bitterly, thought of the look in her eyes and how he had been a stranger to her, even when he’d felt the touch of her skin against his and it was exactly how he always remembered it was--light and gentle and hesitant before it became possessive, like he was something she couldn’t let herself have but didn’t want to let go.

It was _her_ , though. It was Emma. He was sure.

“Hook?” Tink’s voice broke through his memory.

“No.” Killian shook his head. “She knows nothing.”

“So you think--” Neal paused. Rubbed his hand across his forehead, and when he spoke again his voice was suddenly tired. “What, Pan’s curse is stealing the magic from Storybrooke?”

“Exactly,” Killian said. “Whatever his curse is doing, it is _also_ draining the magic from Storybrooke to power itself. It is breaking the link between the denizens of Storybrooke and their non-cursed selves, and leaving nothing to replace it with.”

“And that makes Emma just another piece in one of Pan’s games,” Neal said. “Are we in danger?”

Killian laughed again. Maybe Neal was right to call him crazy.

“None of us came over as part of the curse, so none of us should be affected by whatever Pan’s magic is doing to it,” Tink said.

“We hope,” Killian said, and maybe he had been spending too much time with the heroes of late, but that was all he had: Hope.

“What about my son?” Neal said. “What about Henry?”

“He was born here, not part of the curse,” Tink said, but she shrugged her shoulders. “He apparently aged during the curse and was largely untouched by the magic. We’ll keep an eye on him, Bae.”

“Shit,” Neal muttered. He looked around, clenching his hands together, wrapped them around the back of his neck and put them back in his lap. “Shit,” he said again.

“Aye,” Killian said.

\--

He’s always imagined her, always seen her as tall and proud and relentless and unyielding. Always ready for a fight. He has never seen her fail.

But now she’s in his arms, so small and so light, because--

“I don’t know how to walk,” she’d said, her voice small and strange, scratchy from disuse above the waves.

So he carries her, draping one of her arms around his neck as he balances her weight across his arms. He feels her feet dangle against his knees as he lifts her and makes for the large fallen tree just at the water’s edge near a table he knows the dwarves had used to favor for their lunches. He sets her down gingerly on the log, letting her feet curl along the ground the way her tail might have done. She faces the water and Killian steps over the log, one leg on each side, so that he might face her.

“Who are you?” It is Emma’s voice but lacks her customary sharpness. There is no emotion in her words aside from simple curiosity.

“My name is Killian Jones,” he says.

Nothing else.

Those are the rules.

“I don’t belong here,” she says. “I’m not--” she gestures at her legs and feet. “This isn’t--”

“Aye,” he says. She looks at him sharply. “I happened to be walking by the water, and I saw you change.”

“I’ve seen you before.” Her gaze is appraising. Appreciative.

“You saved me,” he says, rushing before he can stop himself. Then: “Er, from the water. You pulled me out of, shall we say, a tight spot. Some of the sisters from your pod caught me unawares.”

“What’s the matter, Killian Jones? Couldn’t handle it?”

“Perhaps not,” he says, smiling. It hurts, that smile--to paste it onto his face, over the anger that Pan has somehow polluted this, too. To see this woman who is and is _not_ Emma--”I suppose some gratitude is in order, then.”

She smiles at him, and her smile is real, and artless, and open. A childlike smile over a childish prank. “You’re welcome.”

“And may I know the name of my Savior?”

She blinks slowly and says, “Emma.”

“It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Emma,” Killian says, and nothing else.

Those are the rules.

“I guess I’m the one who owes you thanks now,” she says. Her face falls and she wraps her arms around herself, pulling his greatcoat more tightly around a body that is suddenly unaccustomed to the cold. “This is magic, and I don’t--” she shakes her head. “Why are you here, Killian Jones?”

“‘Killian’ will do, lass,” he says, and exhales a deep breath. He looks up and sees the shapes silhouetted against a moon that is slowly beginning to disappear, its shadow turning a deep blood read--hears the cries of the Lost. Killian closes his eyes. “I came here looking for someone,” he says, opening them. “Someone I lost, and I found--”

She’s looking at him, her eyes wide.

“--you,” he says.

And nothing else.

Those are the rules.

Killian Jones does not do well with rules.

\--

Bae _was_ his father’s son. Sometimes, when Killian looked at him, all he saw was a man--the man who was Henry’s father, who had abandoned Emma--and he forgot that, beneath it all, Neal was still that boy he’d looked after all of those years ago.

The boy who, just like his father, was more prepared to run from his problems than to deal with them.

He found them at the town line with Emma’s yellow vessel. It was stopped--parked--haphazardly across the painted yellow stripe on the pavement, the doors flung open. Neal stood at the line, Henry trying to pull him back, yelling.

“We can’t leave now! We can’t leave Storybrooke--Mom’s here, we have to find her!”

“Henry--”

“Everything is here, Dad! Our family--please don’t make me go, you have to--”

“Henry, we can be a family. Together, somewhere safe.”

“But heroes don’t _run_ , they help--”

“I’m not a hero, Henry,” Neal said, and the way Henry’s face fell, the way his words sounded so much like Emma’s had, urging him to _be a part of something_ \--

“But you can be, Baelfire,” Killian said. “You can be the hero and not the villain.”

“Like you?” Neal’s words cut as they hung in the air. Killian said nothing, though--let Neal lash out at something, some _one_ , in the way that was his habit. If Killian had learned one thing from losing Bae all of those years ago, it was to not hit back.

The silence stretched out between them as Henry watched, also silent, and then Neal said: “I need to get out of here and take care of my son. Are you gonna stand in my way?”

“I am in your way,” Killian said. “Because we should be out there, together, looking for Emma and figuring out how to make things right. That’s what your son needs. That’s our best chance. Emma would be doing everything she could to get back to him right now. So would you.”

And there he was, the boy. Neal’s face fell and he rubbed a hand against his forehead. Killian stepped forward.

“What the hell are you doing?” Neal was alarmed.

“Something long overdue,” Killian whispered, tightening his arm around Neal’s shoulder in a hug. “We can’t let ourselves be caught up in nonsense anymore--not over a woman. Not over anything. We need to do this together, for your boy. You can be a better man than your father, Neal. Help me bring his mother home to him.”

Neal chuckled as he stepped away, gingerly pulling out of Killian’s embrace.

“I used to think I’d never have a home again,” he said. “Home is just--it’s a feeling, you know? A place that when you leave, you just miss it.”

It hit Killian in the gut as he said it. Dread and loss, aching; the way he felt every morning before reality set in, when he was still with Emma in his dreams.

 _Home_.

“This is our home,” Henry said stubbornly, looking up at his father, and Killian wondered if Neal saw it in his son’s eyes, the way they were slightly wide with disbelief and disappointment.

“Well.” Pan was amused. “Isn’t this a touching family moment? Oh.” His face clouded in mock consternation. “Were you _leaving_ , Baelfire? You should know better than that. I suppose it’s that nasty habit of self-preservation--it’s a bit of a family trait, I’m afraid.”

“What do you want?” Killian said, pushing Henry slightly behind him as he did so.

“I want to help you find Emma,” Pan said innocently.

“I thought you said this was a game,” Neal said.

“Everything’s a game in Neverland, Baelfire.” Pan soared over them, flipping himself in the air to land on the other side. “But you need to know the rules first. Rule number one is that you cannot leave unless I decide to let you.”

“What about Emma?” Killian said. “I know that she’s here.”

“Are you sure?” Pan grinned. “Maybe it was just a nightmare. An hallucination, a crazy dream from the water. You have enough of those already, don’t you?”

Killian glared.

“What’s this about dreams?” Neal snapped.

Pan looked from Neal to Killian and back again and his expression shifted to something positively gleeful as he leapt back into the air. Killian felt a shiver of true fear.

“Captain Hook, man of honor,” Pan said. He nearly spit the words. “She _is_ here, you know. She _belongs_ here now. Another Lost Girl in Neverland.”

“What did you do to her?” Neal said.

“I freed her,” Pan said. “I freed her from her past and her burdens and her regrets. I freed her from you, Baelfire. From all of you.”

Henry’s eyes lit up and he took a step toward Pan, but Killian pulled on the back of his jacket.

“Stay back, lad,” Killian muttered.

“You really are a special boy, aren’t you, Henry? Your mother’s son.” Pan’s eyes hardened. “But that Emma’s gone. And it’s not just about finding her, is it? It’s about how. Cheaters never win, remember?”

Killian and Neal exchanged glances and Killian nodded. _Together._

“On the darkest night, when Artemis stops chasing the wolf, there will be a doorway. Let the bright moon lead you to it, and she’ll be waiting for you. And _no magic_ ,” Pan said. “That’s rule number two.”

“Oh, come on, enough of this bullshit,” Neal groaned.

“Rule number three,” Pan said, ignoring him, “is that you can’t tell her anything about who she was. She won’t remember, and it will just bind her more deeply to the Curse if you do.”

Pan’s feet touched the ground and he walked first to Killian, peering up at him, and then to Neal, giving him the same examination. “Oh, and one more thing,” he said, as though he had suddenly remembered. “Only one of you is going to be able to find her. You’re going to have to choose which of you will go. Because--” Pan smiled. “--if the wrong person goes, she’ll be lost to you forever. That’s a promise, boys, and I always keep my promises.”

He jumped back into the air.

“Let’s play.”

\--

“Why would you be looking for someone _here_?”

She sounds incredulous but there’s also something playful in her tone. It’s just another reminder of who she is _not_ , of what she is now, but Killian just smiles and says, “I found you, didn’t I?” He raises his eyebrows. “Why are you here, then?”

She bumps against him with her shoulder, conceding the point, and Killian flinches as he forcibly restrains himself from holding her against him before she can pull away.

“It must be the eclipse,” she says. Her voice is smoothing out the more she speaks, becoming more familiar, but _not_. She shrugs, as if it couldn’t possibly be of any less importance to her.

She is carefree, just as Pan had said.

She is happy--or a curse-induced approximation of it.

Killian does not know which would be worse.

He has only his wits and his words to guide him and the idea of making her _un_ happy is troubling to him, especially when she seems so unconcerned. “There are stories about a sea witch who has the power to do this on the night of the fullest moon. It’s just never seemed like something that could happen here. Pan--”

“Aye,” he says. “Pan.”

There is nothing else to say about that, and in the quiet that lingers between them, Killian hears the cries.

But Emma--doesn’t. Because this Emma feels nothing that will make the cries audible to her. “It’ll only last until the next high tide, according to the stories, and I’ll have you to carry me back down, won’t I?”

She smiles at him, smiling like a spoiled child who knows she is going to get her way, and it hurts, it really does, but also--he can’t help himself, not with _Emma Swan_ asking for his help, for no other reason than that she believes he will give it--he laughs, in spite of everything.

It feels good.

He can’t remember the last time he laughed, the last time he’d seen her happy.

“You seem quite sure of that, lass,” he says.

“I’m good at reading people,” she says. “That’s why I pulled you out that day, I had this feeling, it’s like--”

She stops, and he holds his breath, watching her. Waiting.

“A superpower?” he says.

She cocks her head and considers him, like she was trying to taste the word and break down its syllables; finally, she shrugs.

“I trust you,” Emma says, as though it is just that simple, and the way she looks at him, the way that she is looking straight _through_ him as if nothing matters but this moment, here and now, and he is nothing more or less than the man he wants to be--

A man of honor.

“I’m sorry I screamed, before. It was--I was surprised, and you--”

She stops. It is barely the space of a breath but there is something charged in the air and Killian feels it, the power in the moment and the magic binding her and _whatever it is_ between them that haunts his days and his nights and his dreams.

\--

Killian tried to persuade Neal and Henry to come back to the _Jolly Roger_ with him, instead of continuing to stay at the inn. Since he had seen Emma, he found it restful to look upon the water--and he thought, perhaps, there might be safety in numbers.

Mrs. Lucas had gotten awfully fond of her crossbow, of late. And rather indiscriminate in whom she pointed it at.

“No offense, man,” Neal said, “but Granny still has indoor plumbing.”

“Noted,” Killian conceded. “And I am sure that you, lad, want to mark today down in your book.”

And for the first time since he’d met the boy, Henry looked hesitant.

There were Lost Ones in Storybrooke, just like Pan had said--but Killian Jones was damned if he was going to let Henry become one of them. With a raised eyebrow at Neal, Killian lowered himself, one knee on the ground.

“Henry,” he said. “I’ve seen your mum. She’s here. That means we can find her. We just need--”

“A plan, buddy.” Neal put his hand on Henry’s shoulder. “We’ll meet up tomorrow and come up with a plan first thing, okay?” He turned to go back to the car.

“We’re going to find her,” Killian said. “Pan’s not the only one who keeps his promises, do you understand? So keep counting. Don’t give up hope.”

The way Henry was looking at him was nothing so much as the spitting image of his mother. _I can’t take the chance I’m wrong about you_ , she’d said, and Henry--

“Operation Coyote,” he said. “That’s what we’re going to call it.”

And he smiled, and nodded, and turned to go.

“As you wish,” Killian said.

\--

“Operation Coyote? He really is a special boy, isn’t he?” Tink said.

She had said nothing when he’d turned up, his feet taking him deeper into the woods along the town line rather than back to the water he’d claimed to want. But she knew him, perhaps better than almost anyone, and did not seem surprised to see him.

She even had a bottle of rum.

“Just like old times, then?” he said with a leer.

“Not _that_ much like old times, Hook,” she said, and smiled, and that’s when he’d snapped, the tension that had been building up inside of him all day desperate for release. His eyebrows went up and his voice rose and he snapped.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Tinkerbell. Do you really think I could--” he couldn’t even say it “--with _Emma_ \--”

Dread and loss, aching.

 _Home_.

And then, just like he had done with Neal, she stepped forward and gently pulled him into an embrace, and held him, and led him to sit down; they sat there, silently, the untouched bottle of rum between them, her hand wrapped around his, until he slept.

And dreamt.

_There was a boy who told her a story, a fairytale, and she made it her name; there was another boy, a Lost Boy, a man all grown up and he said her name like he can taste it, he can taste her and she felt it under her skin and deep inside of her. She tasted him on her lips and it burned, sweet and spicy  
_ _“I’m looking, Swan,” he said. “I’m looking. Help me find you.”  
_ _The compass rose pointed south.  
_ _“Help me find the way home, Swan.”_

“Killian!” Tink shook him, urgently. “Killian, mate, wake up.”

Killian was groggy from being pulled awake so suddenly. He shook his head in a futile attempt to clear it and glared at Tink through a headache that made him feel as though they should have drunk the rum--at least then his hangover would be real.

“You were crying,” Tink said. “Calling out for Emma.” The sympathy in her eyes was too much and he looked away. “Does that happen every night?”

Killian sat up, slowly. “Near enough,” he said.

“Killian, look at me,” Tink said. He turned and with an exaggerated sigh of patience met her eyes. “Do you really dream of Emma every night?”

“Aye,” he said, then: “I don’t know. I think so. I can’t remember.”

“You’re in love with her,” she said.

“I don’t _know_ ,” Killian said.

“I know you, Killian. Maybe even better than you realize. You fall hard, and you fall fast. You _know_.”

Killian said nothing. He just--nodded.

“Pan said that only one of us can go after her,” he said. “Operation Coyote, Henry called it.”

“Operation Coyote?” Tink said.

“Because Pan is a kind of trickster predator, or so the boy says.” Killian shook his head. “Emma would never recover if something happened to her son. I cannot do anything that might--”

“You think it’s a test.” It wasn’t a question.

“This is Pan, Tink. It’s never not a test.” Killian stood up and started pacing. “He said now we’re going to see what kind of man I am. And I am not the kind of man who is going to destroy this family, or hurt that boy. I think it _has_ to be Neal.”

“What about what Emma wants?” Tink said.

“Emma chose Henry,” Killian said. “Other than that--well, she’s not here to decide, is she.” He could not keep the bitterness from his voice.

\--

Her fingers brush against his tattoo, exposed on his bare forearm, and this time Killian manages not to flinch away. She traces the shape of the heart and the letters of the name and runs her index finger against the length of the inked dagger.

“Milah?” she asks. “Is she who you’re looking for?”

Killian’s breath catches as gently, he takes her hand and removes it--and he’s not sure which is more painful, to feel her touch him or to make her stop--and “No,” he says. “No, she--” he clears his throat “--she died a long time ago.”

She is undaunted by his sudden reticence as her hand goes to his bicep, to the tangle of thorny vines and the name there.

“My brother. He--”

“Dreamshade,” Emma says, recognizing it. “He was poisoned?”

“Aye,” Killian says.

“You’ve faced a lot of loss,” she says. “That must be very lonely.”

“It is,” he says. “It was.”

“I’m sorry,” she says. “You must be a kind of man who feels things very deeply, to mark them permanently on your skin like this.”

“Aye,” he says again. “I suppose I’ve always been--” his mouth twists wryly “--sentimental.”

“Is that why you’re crying?”

She drops her hand and Killian schools the expression on his face into something less intimate, more curious, ignoring the wetness on his cheeks.

“And you, lass? Have you ever been in love?”

“No,” she says. “Never. But I’ve never lost anyone, either.” She smiles, a sweet smile.

“Then I envy you,” he says, and turns to look at the water.

“Do you?” And as she speaks, as her eyes graze over him, she looks so much like _Emma_ \--the way she can read him as easily as he did her and--

He can never regret the way he feels about her.

The way that meeting her, against all odds, against the fabric of time and space, had changed his life--her family, her _son_ , their ridiculous heroic nobleness and the way it had rekindled something within him, something long buried after centuries of neglect, of anger, of sadness, of grief, of _hate_.

“No,” he says, his smile small but genuine. “Perhaps I don’t, at that.”

\--

They lost Belle next and it--it hurt more than Killion reckoned it should.

He barely knew her.

They weren’t _friends._

Did he have any friends? There was Tink--and Bae--each of them both _more_ and _less_ than friends. Killian had found himself missing David, with his attitude and his air of disapproval and his grudging respect, and went to visit him, sitting silently and sipping rum and watching him, often running into Henry whilst he read stories to his grandmother to keep her spirits--her memories--up.

There was Henry.

Henry, in whose veins ran the blood of three of the people Killian loved most in the world, who told stories about his mother and his family, who gave Killian something to hold on to, and who made him wonder if someday, perhaps, he might have with Henry what he hoped to have with Bae.

But Belle was so much more than what he had allowed himself to see in her, and as he watched her grieve for her Rumple as he grieved for Emma--and Killian, at least, had the dreams, had the riddle and the rules and had the _hope_ of seeing her again--he could not suppress the spark of empathy that sprang up inside of him, every morning when they descended upon the library and she had tea ready, hot and steaming and they drank it while she outlined the topics most worthy, in her opinion, of their collective attention.

Until she didn’t.

Until they walked in and found her, lost, wandering the stacks in her dressing gown.

“My mom--Regina--sent her here with no memories,” Henry explained. “She was in the asylum until the curse broke and then--”

Yes, Killian had no difficulty remembering what had happened _then_. He could see the scar where the dressing gown had fallen open. It was a small indignity piled atop so many others but he approached her carefully, pulling the robe closed while Henry tried to call Ruby on his talking phone. It took him three tries.

“Who are you?” Belle whispered as Ruby tried to lead her from the library.

“I’m your friend,” Ruby said. “I’m going to help you.” She gestured around the room. “We all are.”

Killian blushed as he turned to face Belle, but he managed a small nod that was, he hoped, encouraging. “Will you be all right, Red?”

Her features softened and she touched his arm. “I’ll be fine, Hook. It’s not the full moon yet.”

Something flickered in Killian’s mind, something important, and then--

“I don’t understand,” Henry said. “My mom is the Evil Queen and she can’t--why does this keep happening?”

Killian looked to Neal but his attention was on the pile of books laid out on the reference desk.

“Your mother always does things for a reason, lad,” Killian said. “Let’s trust that she is doing all that she can.”

“I’m already down to one mother,” he whispered. “I’m not ready to lose another one.”

“Let’s get you over to your grandmother’s,” Killian said, looking--again--to Neal.

But all Neal said was “I’ll find you guys later.”

And then he didn’t.

Darkness found them along the siderail of the _Jolly Roger_ , where they had also spent the afternoon, watching the horizon for pods of dolphins.

(Or mermaids.)

Killian was attempting to teach Henry how to trace the constellations in the sky.

“Are they they same here as they are in the Enchanted Forest?” Henry asked.

“Some,” Killian said. “The stars are the same, you see, but the stories and the asterisms are a bit different.”

“What about the moon?” Henry asked. “Is it the same? Like, the same size and brightness and stuff?”

“It’s the same,” Killian said, smiling as something occurred to him. “You know, I used to sit like this with your father, telling him about the stars and the moon. I told him about the goddess--”

The goddess of the moon.

 _Artemis_.

_When Artemis stops chasing the wolf._

“Hey,” Neal said, calling from the gangplank as he boarded.

“Hi, Dad,” Henry called back, though he did not get up to greet his father. “Killian’s teaching me about the constellations.”

Killian, however, did get up, his eyes narrowing in suspicion, in worry--in some combination of both--as he approached Neal and muttered, “Where have you been?”

“Oh,” Neal’s gaze shifted. “Um, I was just--”

“We need to talk, mate,” Killian said. “About Pan, and about Emma, and--I think you need to be the one that goes after her.”

Neal stopped mid-sentence and stared. He looked briefly at Henry, still ensconced along the railing, and gestured at Killian to follow him toward the stern, well out of earshot of a boy’s curiosity.

“Listen, man, I spent the day going over some of Belle’s notes, and I have to tell you something.” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “She wasn’t researching Pan’s curse.”

Killian’s eyebrows went up and he said nothing, waiting.

“She wasn’t only researching Pan’s curse,” Neal amended. “She was also helping me--we were trying to figure out if we could maybe bring back my father.”

“Your father is dead, Bae,” Killian said, keeping his voice soft.

“We never saw a body,” Neal said. “She agreed with me that it might be possible--hell, it was her idea!”

Killian sighed and it wasn’t without sympathy but also--

“We don’t have to do this” Killian said. “I believe I have a possible hint for the solution to Pan’s riddle. We can get Emma back, we can--”

“We don’t know anything for sure about whether or not we can get her back or if we can break the curse if we do.”

“ _When_ we do,” Killian said.

Neal started fidgeting again, tracing his fingers along the centuries-old scratched-out symbols in the ancient wood of the _Jolly Roger’s_ helm.

“If we have magic, Killian, magic to go up against Pan’s, none of that needs to matter,” Neal said. “Regina won’t help. Tink can’t. And we don’t know if--” Killian raised an eyebrow, and Neal corrected himself “--when we get Emma back if she’ll even be able to help. You said yourself that she didn’t remember anything, her life, what makes you think she is going to remember her magic?”

“Because I believe in her,” Killian said. “I’ve never yet seen her fail.”

Neal snorted. “I’ve known her a lot longer than you have, Hook. Believe me when I tell you that I’ve seen her do more than her fair share of fuckups.”

Killian turned and looked at Henry, hoping that their words had not carried in the night air.

“Hook,” Neal said, “I’m asking you for your help. To get my family back.”

Killian sighed.

“Killian, please.” Neal’s face fell. “This is the only thing that makes sense to me right now. My father will be able to help us, I know he will.”

“Pan said no magic,” Killian said. “How can you be willing to take that kind of chance with Emma’s life?”

“I know you think you have some kind of bond with Emma,” Neal said, “but can you just _for once_ let me do what I think is right for my son and for my--”

“Emma’s not ‘your’ anything, Neal, don’t you see?”

“--I found them in Neverland, didn’t I?”

“You got captured by Pan,” Killian said. “We could have died in the Echo Caves or in the Dark Hollow were it not for Emma.”

Neal was silent for a long moment and then: “So this is you and Emma, happily ever after?”

“No,” Killian said. “This is about finding her and bringing her back _to her family_. Anything that might happen after that is for Emma to decide. And I already told you, mate, that I think you should be the one to go to her.”

“What about the Curse?”

“I don’t know,” Killian admitted.

“My father might be able to help us break the Curse.”

“Your father is just as likely to get caught up in it as everyone else from our land who was transported by its magic,” Killian said. He reached out, but Neal stepped back.

“Henry,” he said, raising his voice. “It’s time to go back to Granny’s.”

“Would you consider staying here?” Killian asked.

“Oh, can we?” Henry said, appearing at his father’s side.

“Not tonight, bud,” Neal said.

Henry’s gaze shifted to Killian, who winked, and was surprised to receive a solemn nod in return. As the boy and his father retreated down the gangplank, Killian found out why.

Weighted down against the boards of his ship was a note in a boyish, messy scrawl.

 _Operation Coyote. Tomorrow morning. 8am._ _I want to help you find my mom._

Henry was waiting for him at 7:45.

“Tell me about Artemis,” Henry said. “Tell me. Please?”

“Does your father know you’re here, lad? Or Regina?”

Henry rolled his eyes in a gesture so much like his mother Killian had to smile.

“My dad isn’t going to help,” Henry said. “But I want to. The _right_ way. That’s what heroes do.” And he crossed his arms.

Just like his mother would.

Killian sighed, rubbing his hand on the back of his neck and then gesturing at the library door.

“Artemis was the goddess of the moon,” Killian said, pulling the door open. “When Ruby spoke of the full moon yesterday, it occurred to me--” he turned on the lights “--that we had overlooked an obvious hint. But perhaps Belle did not overlook it, perhaps she--”

“Killian?”

“Yes, Henry?”

“Why doesn’t my dad want to help?” The boy sniffled, but his eyes were blazing. “Why doesn’t he believe we can find her?”

“Your father--” Killian said, then paused to gather his thoughts. “Your father has lived a very long time, lad, and has seen a lot of things that make it harder for him to have hope--especially when it comes to Pan.” The image flashed through his mind, of the aborted attempt at time-keeping still preserved on the walls of a cave in Neverland; he recalled the look on Emma’s face as she traced the marks, the way her face fell as she interpreted them. That might have been the first moment of true unguardedness he’d seen from her.

The way she’d immediately deflected, however--that was much more familiar ground for them.

But he’d thought of it often, that moment, over the days and nights of the weeks and months since he’d last seen her. He thought of it when he felt himself wanting to give up, and he thought of it when he saw her son making his own accounting of time in his notebook.

He thought of it every morning, when he woke up with the image of her fading from his memory.

“But you’ve been around even longer than he has,” Henry said. “You’re still looking.”

“Aye,” Killian said. “And I’m not proud to admit that for a long time the only thing that gave me hope was the promise of my vengeance.”

“What changed?”

“I realized that pursuit had left my life empty,” he said, wondering at the depths of the honesty he was sharing with this eleven-year-old boy. “I had an opportunity to change course, lad, and I took it. But for your father, that change came a long time ago, and he is finding it difficult to get his bearings again.”

“So it wasn’t because of my mom?” Henry asked. “My dad says--”

“‘Twas because of your father, Henry. And you. _And_ your mum,” Killian said.

Henry cocked his head and examined him, the same way his mother had done when he’d offered her the bean. Killian wondered if the boy shared his mother’s ‘superpower’, if he knew that Killian was leaving out part of the truth.

_When I win your heart, Emma--_

He was not yet prepared to be _that_ honest with an eleven-year-old boy.

But neither was he prepared to give up the hope that he might someday have that chance.

\--

“So are you going to tell me your story, or what?”

Killian considers her, considers what she is asking of him, and nods.

It might work, as long as he remembers the rules; in fact, it might be his best chance.

He can only cast the dice and see how they fall.

(This is why he always played with loaded dice.)

“For you, lass, I’m an open book, but my story is not a happy one.” He clears his throat. “You should know that from the outset. I am not a good person. Some have called me a villain. And villains--well, we don’t get happy endings, do we?”

(“Believing in even the possibility of a happy ending is a powerful thing,” Snow had said to him earlier that day, saying it as though it had just occurred to her because she couldn’t remember, anymore, how many times she’d said it before.)

“Does she call you that?” Emma asks. “The woman you’re looking for, is that what she would say?”

“I didn’t say I was looking for a woman.”

Emma smirks. “Am I wrong?”

Killian exhales a laugh. “No,” he says, shaking his head. “No, she--we understand each other, I think.” He looks at her and she meets his gaze unflinchingly as he repeats it to himself.

They understand each other.

“How long has it been since you’ve seen her?”

Killian turns away. “Not long, but at the same time, it feels like forever. We haven’t known each other very long, you see, and it was a long road to get to her in the first place.”

Emma’s attention is wholly focused on him in a way that is intense and intentional and it impels him to keep speaking.

“She helped me find myself again.”

Lost Ones recognize their own.

“A villain?”

“A man of honor,” Killian whispers,

Emma tilts her head and narrows her eyes. “Why were you lost?” she says, and she says it with such innocence and sincerity--curse-induced or not--that Killian reaches for her instead of answering; he reaches for her, pulling her hand back to the red heart on his wrist, not even thinking before he does it. “When my brother died, I was a very young, very angry man. I was rudderless, and then I met Milah.”

“And she died,” Emma says.

“Aye,” Killian murmurs, closing his eyes; he finds himself unable to speak, for he has never spoken of this to anyone, not to Emma--not even to Tink.

“She was murdered,” he says. “I did not take her passing well.”

Emma shivers and Killian lets go of her and watches as she re-adjusts his coat around herself; imagines taking her into his arms and keeping both of them warm, the ways he might make her smile and make her laugh and make her _feel_ and--

“Why aren’t you cold?”

Killian snorts. “Milah died more than two hundred years ago, lass. I have lived in every manner of climate since then. It has been a very long time since I have taken notice of either heat or cold--since I have taken notice of anything other than my anger and my grief. The one time I did, I let it slip through my fingers. I convinced myself that I would never change, that I would never get over the pain of losing the great love of my life.”

He could live for another two hundred years and not be able to erase the image of her--small and delicate and wrapped up in nothing but his coat--from his mind.

“I don’t understand,” Emma says. “If this Milah was the great love of your life--”

“I didn’t rightly understand, either,” Killian admits. “But then I met her.”

Something flashes in Emma’s eyes.

Something he recognizes, something he’s seen before.

He holds his breath, waiting, and then--

Emma’s leg jerks and she emits a small shriek of surprise followed almost immediately by a gasp of pain. Killian is immediately on his knees in the sand, using his hook to pull first one foot and then the other into his hand for examination.

“You’ve cut yourself,” Killian says, looking up at her, looking up the soft, pale, smooth skin of her exposed legs. The salt is drying on her skin and he can feel it in his hand; she smells like salt. Salt and the sea, the seaweed in her hair and the leather of his coat. With a deep breath he pulls his hand away and leans forward slightly, their faces inches apart as he asks, “May I?” and gestures at the oversized pocket of the greatcoat.

She is mute as she nods and Killian feels as if there is no air between them, as though neither of them is breathing. Gently he reaches into the pocket and pulls out the flask and the scrap of cloth.

The The same scrap of cloth, for he had kept it when he’d retrieved his hook from the drawer in her office, just as she had kept it after he had given it to her.

Foolish, maudlin, sentimental _nonsense_ but as he splashes the rum over her wound and binds it with the strip of black fabric it is impossible to ignore the charge surrounding them and how it feels exactly the same as it had done back on top of that beanstalk.

When he finally exhales she is watching him.

“She deserted me,” Killian says as Emma jumps. “And I returned the favor. I deceived her and I disappointed her, as she disappointed me. I kissed her and wondered if I had betrayed my own heart. And now--I can't even be sure that she knows I exist.”

Emma looks away as he watches her.

“Now, she’s the one who is Lost.”

And in that moment Killian sees the first sign that _this_ Emma, perhaps, is not so different from the one he knows, no matter what Pan says: as he looks into her eyes with all of the emotion he is struggling to contain, she blinks, and shrinks away. She buries herself more deeply inside his coat and pulls her foot from his hand.

Still a challenge.

Still afraid.

But never as indifferent as she claims to be--then, or now.

“You’re right,” she says. “That doesn’t sound like a happy story.”

“Perhaps I just need to have more belief in the possibility of a happy ending,” Killian says, but she turns away, staring resolutely at the water as if he isn’t even there.

\--

In the end, the solution was simple.

And complicated.

 _On the darkest night, when Artemis stops chasing the wolf, there will be a doorway_.

“It’s an eclipse,” Killian said, scrubbing his hand down his face. “An eclipse of the moon. In many realms, they are believed to mark moments of change, of possibility. Some even believe they can be doorways into other realms or states of being.”

“That,” Neal said, slamming a book shut, “sounds like total bullshit.”

Henry winced.

“You’ve been in this realm a while now, Hook, you should know that astrology isn’t real. It’s just superstitious bulls--” he glanced at Henry “--crap.”

“And I thought you had lived long enough aboard my ship to know that a seafaring man never takes superstitions lightly,” Killian said evenly. “Of all of the things you’ve seen, why is this so hard for you to believe?”

“Because it’s too easy,” Neal said. “An eclipse? That’s it?”

“Not just any eclipse, I fear,” Killian said. “An eclipse of the full moon. Perhaps something more, for I do not know what it could mean for there to simultaneously be an eclipse as well as a ‘bright moon’. And eclipses are a bit--unpredictable. It could be tomorrow or ten years from now and Storybrooke will have faded completely into the forest by then--”

“It’s a supermoon,” Henry said, poking at the screen of his talking phone. “When there is a total lunar eclipse during a supermoon, the moon turns red.” He looked up, darting his eyes from Killian to his father and back again. “There’s one in a month on the night of the next full moon. According to this, ‘the closer the moon is to the earth, the more intense the pull on the tides, as well as your instincts and your feelings.’”

Neal and Killian both started speaking at the same time.

“How do you--”

“Are you seriously telling me that Pan set up this ridiculous riddle and you solved it with Google?”

“I’m saying that now we have _something_ , at least,” Henry said, shrugging. “Something we can try. I’m gonna go tell grandma. Maybe it’ll help her remember.” He stood up and pulled his bag over his head, settling the straps on his shoulders. “See you at dinner?”

“Henry, lad, be careful of the--”

“Shadow,” Henry said, rolling his eyes. “I know.” He moved to leave but stopped and turned back. “Thanks, Hook,” he muttered.

Killian nodded and turned back to Neal, who was watching him.

“What?”

“So you’re playing nanny now, too?”

“I’m fond of the boy,” Killian said. “I didn’t realize that was a problem.”

Neal regarded him. “What’s it feel like to play the hero after being a pirate for so long?”

“Unfamiliar,” Killian said. “How does it feel to play the villain?”

Neal laughed. “I’m a villain now?”

“That depends,” Killian said. “We have a clue and a date and a time. Are you going to use that information to go after Emma, or to--”

“--We could use that energy to find my father and break the Curse,” Neal said. “The doorway, or whatever it is.”

“That spell requires a life for a life, which is probably why Belle didn’t tell you about it. The darkest of magic and an even darker price. You do that and you won’t just be playing the villain. Take my advice. Don’t do it. The ends do not justify the means.”

“I’ve had just about enough of your hero act--”

“I’m not a hero, Bae, but this isn’t an act. Learn from my mistakes--”

“People don’t change, _Hook_.”

“Your father did,” Killian said. “He died for the chance to make it right. Honor that sacrifice, Bae. Be the better man. Be the father your son needs. Bloody hell, be the _hero_ that Emma needs.”

Neal was silent and Killian got up to leave.

“Hey,” Neal said. “Is it true that you’ve been dreaming about Emma?”

Killian rubbed the back of his neck and nodded, slowly.

“Okay,” Neal said. He pushed the book away and stood up and stepped forward and punched Killian in the face.

\--

Tink magicked him a cold compress and did not even try to hide her disappointment.

“Honestly,” she said, “with the two of you it’s never hard to remember that you both spent years on an island ruled by demon children and their evil overlord, the way you carry on.” But she placed the compress gently across his eye and his cheek and Killian knew better than to complain.

“Killian,” Tink said.

“No,” he said.

“It has to be you, you know that, right? The dreams--”

“And thank you so much for telling Baelfire about that,” Killian said.

“Do you ever consider that your history with him might be--”

“I consider it literally every day,” he said.

“That’s exactly my point, mate,” she said. “I think it’s blinding you to the obvious solution. Both of you, in fact, because his obsession with finding his father is not going to end well. Neither,” she said, squeezing his arm for emphasis, “is you sending Neal to bring her back.”

Killian sighed. “Will you hand me my satchel?” He felt the weight of it when she draped the strap over his hook and pulled it toward him, reaching into it in search of the flask.

“I don’t think he wants to go, Tink,” Killian said as he worked the cork out. “I can’t understand why, but he shuts down whenever I bring it up. She was his first love. It’s the happy ending everyone seems to want.”

“First love is not the same as true love,” Tink said. “You know that better than anyone.”

“Do I?” he said, taking a sip and wincing.

“Explain this then,” she said, brandishing a sheet of paper that had fallen from his bag.

He peeked out from under the compress and shrugged. “It’s a sketch, nothing more.”

“It’s another one of your tattoo designs,” Tink said. “Do you think that I don’t know what it means when you mark yourself like this, when I did most of these for you? This is about you remembering someone you love.”

“Yes, I love her,” Killian said. It was nearly a shout and Tink pulled back at the abruptness in his voice. “What does that signify? She’s gone, possibly forever, and never gave me any reason to--”

“Now you’re just lying to yourself,” Tink said. “For someone who claims to be ‘quite perceptive’ you’re also a blooming idiot. But there’s something I think you need to know about her. Your dreams, they’re--”

“The desperate fantasies of a desperate man,” Killian said. “Are you happy? May I sleep now?”

“After all of that, you think I’m letting you sleep here?” Tink said. Killian put the rum down and reached for the compress, shifting it so that he could raise his eyebrow.

“Fine,” she said. She gestured at the sketch. “I’ll just do this then, shall I? Make myself useful?”

“Fine,” he said, mimicking her voice.

She looked at him, tilting her head and narrowing her eyes for a minute until her features relaxed. She bit her lip and smiled, suddenly pleased.

“Rest now, mate,” she said, her voice honey-sweet. “I’ll take care of it.”

_She kissed him. She ran her hands over his skin and followed the trail with her mouth, connecting the dots and the shapes that they formed.  
_ _Heart  
_ _Vine_ _Swan (Emma Swan)_

 _It was real. He was real.  
_ _He loved her. He recognized her. He found her.  
_ _The stars on his back marked her way home.  
_ _“Come back to me  
_ _Killian”_

Henry found him eating his breakfast in the diner. Long gone were the days when Ruby brought him a cup of tea or her grandmother flirted in exchange for food. These days, more often than not, when Mrs. Lucas was looking at him as if he was what Ruby called a “snack” she didn’t mean it as a compliment.

Henry slid into the booth opposite him and watched as Killian drank his tea, but the instant the cup hit the saucer the boy seemed to burst.

“It has to be you,” Henry said.

“Excuse me?”

Henry fidgeted and the bench underneath him groaned in response. “I’ve been thinking about it, and it has to be you that goes after my mom on the night of the eclipse.”

“Henry, I can’t.”

“That’s bullshit, Hook, and you know it.” The boy’s glare was all Emma. “You’re the one that’s in love with her.”

“Language,” Killian murmured. “Such language.”

“I’m not wrong, though,” Henry insisted. “Listen, it’s not that I don’t love my dad. Or believe in him, or whatever. But he and my mom, they’re not--”

Henry quieted, sniffling.

“They’re not,” Killian agreed. “But your mother and I--”

“You dream about her every night,” Henry said, pulling his notebook from his bag. “Every night she’s been gone. Tink says so.” He pointed at the marks, at all of the days and nights they had been separated. “That’s, like, soulmate stuff. True Love.”

“Lad, I know your grandparents provide a tempting example, especially given our current dire straits,” Killian said, “but True Love is the rarest magic of all. And I have no cause to believe that your mother feels--”

“Whatever,” Henry said. He shoved the notebook across the table. “She likes you, I know it. You just have to give it your best chance.”

Killian sighed. His shoulder itched and he twisted to reach it with his hook, but it had stopped just as Henry stopped speaking. He slumped, just a little, forcing his shoulders down from his neck where they had tensed up.

“Excuse me,” he said, and got up to find the washroom.

The footsteps that came up behind him as he examined Tinkerbell’s handiwork in the mirror were not Henry’s, however.

“Wow,” Neal said, and Killian yanked his shirt and coat back over the ink.

“What do you want, Neal?”

“Why do you want me to go after Emma so badly?”

Killian looked up, meeting Neal’s gaze in the mirror.

“Because I’m trying to do the right thing,” Killian said. “For once. I promised you I’d give you a chance to be with your family, Bae. With your son. This is all another part of Pan’s game, and I will not let our quarrel over Emma be a roadblock to her safe return.”

“Wow,” Neal said again, then: “You’re an idiot.”

Killian turned and Neal gave him a half smile and said, “But so am I.” He sighed. “Listen, man, I heard what Henry said to you. And it just--it reminded me of why she and I will never work. Because at the end of the day, we have a crappy history and an amazing kid and nothing else. She won’t ever choose me. She can’t forgive me for leaving her.”

“Maybe she shouldn’t,” Killian said.

Neal’s gaze hardened but Killian did not break eye contact and finally he shrugged. “Maybe she shouldn’t. But she’d never be able to believe that I wasn’t going to leave again. And for this whole eclipse thing to work, you have to believe. So what I am choosing to believe is that you will bring her back safely. Everything else can wait until then, okay?”

Killian was speechless as Neal backed away from the washstand and turned to leave.

\--

The moon is almost completely covered in shadow now, its glow a faint blood red. Time, illusory though it feels in the cursed darkness of Storybrooke, is passing quickly and Killian is running out of options.

And hope.

Killian knows better than most that words can be wielded as weapons even more deadly than swords; here, words are his only weapons and they are failing him. They are failing him as he is failing her. The silence lengthens between them and the cries of the Lost come and go like the waves, ebbing and flowing. It breaks his heart to admit it, even if only to himself--but he is beginning to wonder if he had been wrong to come here, and foolish to have ever believed that he might be the one Emma needs.

He should never have allowed Neal to--

“What was that?” Emma says. “Did you hear something?”

Killian watches her, settling himself back on the log before he answers.

Hope is such a tenuous thing.

“What did you hear?”

“It sounded like someone was crying,” Emma says.

“Do you still hear it, lass?”

She turns to face him and shakes her head and Killian makes a decision, because the time for rules is done. Now it’s time to push, to map out exactly the lines where her boundaries are drawn and to put his toes exactly on the edge before he reaches over. “Let me ask you a question,” he says. “Are you happy?”

She bites her lip and it’s a tell. She’s an open book.

“Why would you ask me that?”

“You’re not the only one who is good at reading people.”

But his triumph--if that’s what it is--is short-lived. Something comes over her as her entire body seems to shake for an instant and then--

“Of course I’m happy,” she says. Her smile is the capricious, blank, childlike smile of the mermaid in the water with its hint of cruelty lurking at the edges, not the too-rare smile he had occasionally coaxed out of Emma Swan, the one that made her eyes light up with the far-away promise of something _more_.

A light that lead him _home_.

He pushes, one toe over the line.

“I don’t think you are,” he says. “I think you’re a little lost too, aren’t you? Like me, like my--”

He stops; she isn’t is.

But he is, irrefutably, hers.

“She and I were both lost, but she was luckier than I: she was found. She has a family. And a _son_. And when she found me it made no sense and neither of us wanted it, but she offered me a chance, and I took it, and we were a part of something--together.”

“She sounds like some kind of saint,” Emma says, her mouth tilting into a sneer. “Why would she end up with someone like you?” All of her earlier easiness--her candor, her curiosity, her trust--was gone. He knows it’s the magic--because he knows her, he knows the way that she shuts herself down, and this is not it.

It is the magic.

Killian stands, putting distance between them for the first time since she’d washed ashore. Since he’d carried her.

He pushes, another toe over the line.

“I’m not a hero,” he says. “I never was. I’ve traveled through realms, crossed oceans; I’ve lived longer than should even be possible. I’ve lied, stolen, killed and tortured to get what I want, all in the pursuit of my revenge--but when I finally tasted it, it was bitter when I thought it should be sweet. And there she was, the Savior. Emma Swan.”

He turns away and closes his eyes and does not see her reaction to the name ‘Swan’.

“She’s no saint. She’s a Savior, and I just want her to come home. Even if it’s not to be with me. Because I am not the only one who needs her.”

He’s out of time, he can feel it. The moon is brightening again and the magic is tightening again but she’s heard the cries and Killian Jones has not survived as long has he as by giving up.

He keeps pushing.

“The thing about having a broken heart is that if it can be broken, that means it’s still working,” he says. “And for a long time I didn’t know that mine could still work, and then it was broken again. I’d lost her, but for the first time in a long time, I had hope.”

He can see the shadows as they fly across the moon.

“And I think that she could have loved me, if we’d had more time. And maybe--maybe that’s enough, to have felt that between us, even if it was never meant to last. Bloody hell, I dream about her every night--”

“What is that?”

Killian half-turns, twisting at his waist to look over his shoulder, grimacing as he can see the tattoo there in the brightening moonlight. It covers his shoulder and part of his back, down his shoulder blade, and the design of it-- _his_ design--is a compass rose.

It’s for good luck. It’s meant to help a sailor find his way home.

But his is not just any compass rose.

“Nothing,” he says, blinking back tears. “Merely a good luck charm, a bit of sailing superstition to point the way home.”

“You’re lying,” she says. “Why are you lying, Killian Jones?”

In Henry’s book of this realm’s asterisms there was, near the horizon line, a simple cross-like shape: Cygnus. The swan. Across Killian’s back tts stars trace out the shape of the compass rose and the cardinal directions--north, east, and west--the lettering done by his own hand.

“Did you say ‘Swan’? Emma _Swan_?”

At the base of the compass rose, where it would normally point south, there is a stylized bird and Killian is on his knees in front of her in the sand before he has even consciously decided to move.

“Aye, love,” he said. “A swallow always returns to its home, according to the lore. But the woman I love, she’s not a swallow, she’s a Swan, and--” he stops, inhales, _pushes_ “--she’s the one who led me home. Home, it’s--”

Her fingers are tracing the tattoo on his back just as they had done to the shapes on his arm and his wrist, but it’s different, it _feels_ different, like there is a spark of--

“Something you just miss,” she says, a mere whisper barely audible above the waves.

\--of magic.

She shakes her head and looks at him.

She looks at him, and she sees _him_.

“Hook?” She shifts, her hands reaching for his face as she moves to lower herself down to the sand.

“Swan?” He has one knee up as he leans forward, reaching to steady her as she moves, but she doesn’t need it, she doesn’t, and she _knows_ him, and--

“Bad form, Captain.” The tide leaps forward all at once and there is Pan, hovering in front of them as the water splashes Killian’s boots and Emma’s bare feet.

No, not her feet. In front of his eyes her legs fall together and stretch, elongating as her feet flare out into fins, the rainbow of scales reappearing on her skin as she loses her balance and falls into the deepening water. She’s thrashing and moaning and she throws her head back, an arc against the night sky as he can see the slashes beneath her ears appear as though they have been drawn with a red-hot poker.

The waves are drawing deeper by the second, Pan’s magic calling it forth as he reclaims his favorite game piece and Emma, with one final defiant cry, throws herself into the waves.

Killian bends at the waist and pulls off his boots, hopping and struggling and tossing them behind him as he wades deeper into the water after her. He has eyes only for Emma, for the place where her tail broke the surface and she has gone under.

He is going to bring her back, or he is going to die trying.

He is done playing Pan’s game.

He dives in.

He dives, and is immediately pulled under, like there is an achor tied to his feet. He strokes and kicks and there is a burst of energy rushing through his body, his blood pumping, but the water surrounds him and, with unrelenting pressure, pulls him farther down. His chest burns. His eyes burn.

And then he sees her.

She looks at him with Emma Swan’s eyes and recognizes him and the last thing Killian remembers before he passes out is the feel of her fingers as they trace the tattoo on his back and the way that, for a split second, he feels like he can fly.

\--

He dreams of her.

_He’s laid out on the ground, cold and unmoving, no rise and fall of his chest to give comfort; her fingers brush against the hair in his eyes, they trace the edge of his jawline as she bends over him.  
_ _“Come back to me,” she says, breathing into his mouth, and there is the weight of her on top of him, magic pressing down on him as if it can squeeze the water from his body and his lungs--and it hurts, having the life forced back into him._  
_She says it again, a whisper as she breathes into his mouth: “Please, come back to me--”  
_ _Killian_

No, wait.

He opens his eyes and coughs, rolling over as his body forcibly expels the green water from his lungs, breathing heavily--panting, wheezing--but there is the touch of her fingers along his forehead, brushing the hair out of his eyes.

“Swan?” She smiles and nods and it’s _her_ smile, only the promise doesn’t seem quite so far away anymore and the light in her eyes is quite bright. “What did you do?”

Instead of answering, she leans down and the taste of her is sweetness and sorrow and a hundred mysteries he cannot name; he shakes as it reverberates through him, as the world shatters and is made whole again.

He is home.

There is a burst of rainbow light, but Killian doesn’t even notice.

-30-


End file.
